Don't Start Without It!

I recently read the book titled "Taking Charge Of Your VoIP Project" by John Q. Walker and Jeffrey T. Hicks. ISBN: 1587200929.
The title is a great reference for understanding VoIP technology and helps identify the many aspects that one must consider for a successful deployment of Voice over IP. Reading this book ahead of time will empower the reader with the lingo, technology and solutions to be effective when leading a team.
The book starts out by giving the reader an understanding of the basic technology concepts surrounding traditional voice networks, or Public Switched Telephone Networks (PSTN) and then goes right into the basic technologies that allow Voice over IP (Data) to be a viable alternative to the traditional phone networks.
Chapter 2, Building a Business Case for VoIP, gives the reader good information to ponder over and helps identify purpose for building a case for a VoIP solution.
The next chapter, "Planning for VoIP" is one of the larger chapters and for good reason. After all, anyone in business knows that planning determines whether the project will go smoothly with little surprise or whether it's a disaster. In this chapter you'll learn about reliability, call quality assessment, and over all VoIP readiness assessment, among other things.
Another great chapter is Chapter 5, "Quality of Service and Tuning". Probably one of the biggest challenges that an organization will face. QoS is challenging due to the complexity of a true end-to-end QoS solution in an already complex data network. Accomplishing QoS requires in-depth knowledge of the existing data network. Furthermore, the communication to others on the team of what it's going to take to get the network "up to snuff" to support VoIP will be a task in and of it self. It makes ATM technology look quite attractive. The chapter has quite a bit of detail; however the authors don't drop the reader over the deep end of the technologies.
I would recommend this book to those that are anticipating implementing Voice over IP in their network, those that are in the process of piloting Voice over IP or even those that are in the midst of a VoIP implementation would benefit from this title.
The book is best suited for Project Managers, management, telecommunication and Data networking personnel. Really and truly, most anyone would benefit from reading this title. It covers such a broad range of information that having a well educated project team is going to ensure that the project goes smoothly and all things are considered. This book does an excellent job of presenting all of the issues that personnel involved in a Voice over IP project should be aware of to ensure success. It gives the reader a great appreciation for the complexities and helps a great deal with ironing out a good sound strategy.
This book has several figures, tables and diagrams. Like the old saying goes, "A picture is worth a thousand words". This statement holds true in the title. Like I always say, pictures are good.
The book covers everything you'd think about and everything you wouldn't think about.
Coming from the data side of a VoIP solution, I thought I had enough figured out to make a VoIP project a success. This titled made me think about issues that I would have otherwise over looked. Especially issues relating to traditional telecommunications.
Don't start you project without this book. It may end up costing you more than this book in mistakes if you don't.

Other Reviews

• Why VoIP Engineers need Project Management skills
• Excellent IT Planning Guide
• VoIP From a Business Perspective
• Don't Start Without It!